The Republican file photoArlo Guthrie perfoms at Westfield State College.

Summer is on the horizon - time to empty my reporter’s notebook.

ARLO GUTHRIE is no stranger to covering his father Woody’s songs: “Oklahoma Hills,” “1913 Massacre,” “Deportees.”

Now it is Arlo’s turn to be covered by one of his own kids.

The new compact disc - “My Father’s Songs” - features the children of famous songwriters singing songs their dads made famous.

Sarah Lee Guthrie records one of Arlo’s signature tunes, “Coming Into Los Angeles.” Sarah Lee - a singer/songwriter herself - slows down the tempo of the tune her father sang at Woodstock, 10 years before her birth.

Last fall Sarah Lee, 31, and her musician husband Johnny Irion and two daughters released a kid’s album on Smithsonian Folkways, “Go Waggaloo,” that featured three songs featuring lyrics by her grandfather but never put to music. Old family friend Pete Seeger plays on the album with the lead vocal on “Comin’ ‘Round the Mountain.”

Arlo still lives in the Berkshire County town of Washington while Sarah and her family reside in South Carolina.

Other songs on “My Father’s Songs” include Salvador Santana, son of Carlos, covering “Evil Ways;” Jen Chapin’s take on Harry’s “Cat’s in the Cradle;” Ben Taylor’s interpretation of James’ “Bartender Blues;” Ivan Neville’s rendition of the Neville Brothers’ “Yellow Moon;” and A.J. Croce’s bow to his father Jim’s “Lover’s Cross.”

JIM BOUTON was a former 20-game winner for the New York Yankees back in the dynasty days. He now lives in Egremont.

Forty years ago, his book “Ball Four” was published. It absolutely changed the way people looked at baseball players, sometimes in shocking (for the time) and hilarious ways.

At the end of the 20th century, Time Magazine hailed it as one of the 100 most influential books of the century.

David Simon, the former Baltimore Sun reporter who created the television hits, “Homicide: Life On the Street,” and “The Wire,” was asked last year by an Irish journalist which book he used as a model for “Homicide.”

“The prototype was ‘Ball Four’ by Jim Bouton,” he said. “It’s an amazing book. Bouton was a pitcher who had thrown out his arm. He had a brief famous period when he was a fireballer.

Anyway, he was clinging to the margins of professional baseball called the Seattle Pilots, which is no longer around. They were like a last-place team, and there were a lot of characters on the team. And he just took notes; it was hang-around journalism. Bouton captured this moment in time brilliantly.

I read that book when I was around 12, and got it out and re-read it before I started writing ‘Homicide’ because it really did have that sort of blunt, honest, day-to-day tone. It was the template for ‘Homicide’.” Last month, Jim was asked by the New York Post to select his favorite baseball books.

He started with Pat Jordan’s “A False Spring.”

“When I read it, I thought it was fantastic, maybe the best sports book ever written,” Jim said.

John Thorn’s “Treasures of the Baseball Hall of Fame,” made the list along with Mark Harris’ “Bang the Drum Slowly,” and Lawrence Ritter’s “The Glory of Their Times.”

Jim said: “Shortly after ‘Ball Four’ came out in 1970, I was at a party and a guy said: ‘Congratulations on writing the second greatest baseball book of all time.’ I asked,” Jim recalled. “‘Who wrote the first?’ And he said he did. It was Larry Ritter. And it is one of the great books.”

The 12-room house on 221 Enfield Street was considered his refuge from public life. He sold the mansion-like showplace in 1953 because he needed the money. His support of the Soviet Union resulted in his passport being revoked. He couldn’t travel overseas for concerts.

In the late 1940s, he was called before the House of Representatives Committee on Un-American Activities. At one point, Paul shouted at members: “You’re the real un-Americans and you should be ashamed of yourself.” Paul died in 1976. He was 77.

Over the past 20 years there has been a Robeson Renaissance:

He was recognized with a Grammy Award for lifetime achievement in 1999; posthumously inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. In 2004, the U.S. Postal Service, as part of its Black Heritage series, issued a Paul Robeson stamp. In the July issue of MOJO, the terrific British rock magazine found in the best music and periodical racks, boasts Tom Waits on the cover and as editor.

The magazine comes complete with a disc of 15 songs selected from Tom’s jukebox. They include a selection each from Ray Charles, Hank Williams, Hank Ballard, Bob Dylan, Son House, Howlin’ Wolf, Harry Belafonte and Paul Robeson singing “No More Auction Block.”